County Cricket Round-Up - 23rd August

All eyes will be turned towards Wantage Road tomorrow morning to see if Tom Poynton and Wayne Madsen can break the 102-year-old world record ninth-wicket partnership. They both have career-best scores to their names and added 259 together on day three.

Durham collapsed to 35 for four in pursuit of 151 against Worcestershire but still ran out winners by six wickets at Chester-le-Street. Dale Benkenstein and Paul Collingwood both hit unbeaten half-centuries to undo the damage done by Alan Richardson’s triple strike as they shared an unbroken fifth-wicket partnership of 119.

Sussex continued their habit of springing a surprise in this year’s LV= County Championship by closing on 31 without loss in pursuit of 164 to win against title contenders Somerset at Taunton. They progressed to 279 in their first innings thanks to an unbeaten 57 from Amjad Khan, before bowling the home side out for just 195 in their second. Monty Panesar followed up the best innings analysis of his career yesterday with another six wickets today to give him career best match figures of 13 for 137. Arul Suppiah top-scored for Somerset with 59 and had added 84 for the first-wicket with Marcus Trescothick (38).

Middlesex closed day three in a strong position against division leaders Warwickshire at Edgbaston. After a difficult start where they allowed the home side to get up to 333 in their first innings and then lost two early wickets in their second, they never looked back and closed on 351 for five. Chris Rogers and Dawid Malan both made centuries and added 203 for the third-wicket, while Gareth Berg ended the day unbeaten on 53 and shared an unbroken sixth-wicket stand of 99 with Malan, who ended on 138 not out.

In Division Two, promotion hopefuls Hampshire closed on 77 for four as they attempted to chase down a target of 441 against Leicestershire at Grace Road. Matthew Hoggard followed up his four first innings wickets with two in the second after the home side had declared their second innings on 265 for eight. All of the Leicestershire middle-order reached double figures, with Ramnaresh Sarwan’s fluent 46 the highest individual contribution.

It was an extraordinary third day at Wantage Road where Derbyshire, resuming on 163 for five against Northamptonshire, reached stumps on 512 for eight. They made moderate progress, reaching 253 for eight, but the defining moment of the day was still to come. Wayne Madsen and wicket-keeper Tom Poynton, who boasted an average of just 12 from 17 matches coming into this match, had added 259 for the ninth-wicket by the time stumps were pulled. Madsen ended with the maiden double hundred of his career, while Poynton ended with his maiden century. The pair need to score just 24 more runs tomorrow to equal the 102-year-old club and world record, which is currently held by Arnold Warren and John Chapman.

Lancashire secured a home semi-final in the Clydesdale Bank 40 with a comfortable eight-wicket win over Essex at Chelmsford. Karl Brown and Steven Croft both made unbeaten half-centuries and put on 160 for the third-wicket after the loss of both openers in the first powerplay. Essex had earlier been bowled out for 186, with Oliver Newby taking five wickets and Mark Pettini - one of six Essex batsmen to be dismissed in the 20s - top-scoring with 27.

Weather Forecast: The dry and sunny spell will come to an end tomorrow as the wind and rain returns across England and Wales. The worst affected areas will be the west of England and south Wales.

County News In Brief:The ECB have announced which England centrally contracted players they are releasing back to their counties for the remainder of the season. Kevin Pietersen has been made available for all of Surrey’s matches, while Andrew Strauss will feature in Middlesex’s final two Championship games. Yorkshire have been told that Tim Bresnan will be unavailable for county duty for the rest of the season, but still hold out hope of having him released for Friends Life t20 Finals Day – especially if tomorrow’s ODI at Cardiff is washed out. Full team news for Finals Day will follow in tomorrow’s County Cricket Round-Up.

Hampshire seam bowler Hamza Riazuddin has received three penalty points for a second level one breach of the ECB’s disciplinary code within the space of 24 months. The offence was committed during the second XI match against Sussex earlier this month.